I have an 01 Tundra and after hearing and reading about the great benefits of the K&N and Amsoil air filters I purchased an Amsoil dual oil/foam air filter that they claim is superior to the K&N oil/cotton air filter. I had previously been told that there is no - none - nuca - nadda - premium oil/foam/cotton air filter currently on the market or in a development stage that will keep dirt particles out of your engine as well as paper air filters. The oil/foam air filters will allow at least 30 times more dirt to enter your engine. Well, I went with the propaganda/marketing and disregarded educated advice. I sent an oil sample into Predictive Maintenance Services in Uhrichsville, Ohio for piece of mind two weeks ago - well now I've got a case of the a*s as the results show that my silicon content is a whopping 59 - it should be in single digits!!!! I immediately checked my induction system for any leaks or any signs of a previous leak - checked out perfect, no leaks - My iron is at 16, copper is 34, tin is 4 and aluminum is 3!!!! What that means is the damn dirt is acting like a lapping compound causing high copper (34, should be low single digit), Tin (4, should be lower or 0), Aluminum, as these softer wear metals are immediately being affected by the abrasive (dirt). An in-law of mine ran the K&N on his Dodge diesel and went back to factory paper after he got his oil analysis back. I just smiled because I told him to go Amsoil - who's laughing now? I guess the experts are right - you can have either good air flow or good dirt blocking performance BUT not both from one air filter - your choice - I'm going back to factory paper today.

How many miles on your truck and have you did any other mods? Just curious, I don't usually put alot of faith in the oil thing, most domestics are off the chart and I had one that was worse than yours on paper but it was carb, which is different all together but I got 180,000 miles out of it and it was a FORD. Thought that was pretty good for what the oil said. oH well when this engine goes I'm going with a LS1 w/ a T56 so I'll run a Amsoil till the day it dies [img]images/icons/smile.gif" border="0[/img] Sorry to hear about it for you though.

What I've done in the past is drain the factory oil at 1K, fill with dino and drain that at 1500 miles (500 miles on the second fill)- thinking being that the two drains will flush the crud from the block. Then I fill with synthetic. With this particular Tundra I just changed over at 1K and in the process I noticed a little slop in the manufacturing process. When I changed the lube in the transfer and differential housings I found serious chunks of metal from the factory guys cutting the plug hole threads. Hard to believe they can't take 10 seconds and wipe the crud out - I took the shavings to the dealership and the foreman blew it off as typical. I might have blasted the oil foam/cotton air filter too soon as I've since corresponded with a couple more well educated guys in the field of petroleum engineering. I've got a couple more takes on the numbers - as they said, ask 10 engineers and you'll probably get several different answers - anyway - they all favored paper air filters and all stated that as the paper filter gets dirtier it also becomes more efficient at filtering out dirt!! but it also restricts air flow more. Only one thought my high silicon count was due to the Amsoil air filter. The others attributed it to crud left in the engine from the manufacturing process, the engine break-in process, possible contamination from the collection process (crud slowly leaching out of the drain hole). Based on the axle housing crud this is a possibility! This assumption was based on the numbers from the Chromium wear - Zero (0), which is a direct read as to ring wear. I've also got 15,000 miles on this oil with one filter change at 10,000 miles. I'm running Amsoil 2000 0-30wt. (I've also got the dual remote oil filtration unit installed with SDF15 and BE100 filters) They said the contaminants will accumulate as will the wear metals using extended drain intervals, which isn't a problem to the engine using a high quality oil filter but the numbers will be higher overall than if I drained at recommended intervals. The Tundra has an oil cooler which I'm sure has a copper core. So prior to the core becoming oxidized, copper will show up in the analysis. They all recommended another analysis at 5,000 miles and then another in February 2003 to determine a pattern (baseline?) which will then give me a basis to make an educated opinion on what's going on within my engine and if there appears to be a problem they can probably pinpoint the reason. They expressed confidence that my numbers will be within the normal to below normal range with my current oil filter setup after another 5K as I just drained my oil (all 8.5 quarts). We will see. IÆll stay with the Amsoil air filter for another 5K. Anyway - The mods to my Tonka: I've installed the ARB rear locker. I've got a pair of raceway coilovers for the front setting in my garage as I'm waiting for my rear spring set (lifted 2.5 inches and rated for 1K#Æs of bed weight) from National Springs to get here - maybe by the middle of March hopefully. Sway-A-Way is coming out with rear shocks next month for a two-inch rear lift and I'll install them to complement the coilovers and rear leafs. I've got the ARB bawl calf front bumper on order - should be here in April I'm hoping. I'll put a winch on that bumper and I should be good to go this spring when I get on a few back trails that lead to some good fishing lakes. The only people on these lakes are fly-in dudes and damn fool hearty 4wheelers. IÆve also got the front skid plate from Skid Row and will get the rest of the skid plates from Eric as he develops them. Their top notch and reasonable. When these tires wear out and if I feel the need for a little more ground clearance I'll go with 33's and re-gear to either 470 or 488 - To my knowledge no one makes the 470 for the Tundra so I'd have to get them off a Taco as it now stands. Sorry about the long winded reply but since I may have jumped the gun on criticizing the air filters I couldnÆt figure a way to shorten this.

Got my second certified oil analysis back using the Amsoil air filter. I had 5260 miles on the oil using the Amsoil dual air filter oiled at the factory. The driving conditions were very good as there was no blowing sand, dirt etc for this test. The tech was probably right in that I had a lot of crud left in the engine block during the manufacturing process that gave me higher contaminant readings on that first test. That being said, this test still gave higher readings in contaminants & wear metals than a good paper pleated air filter. My silicon level was 11ppm on the contaminant side while the iron reading was 9, lead was 1, aluminum 2, nickel 1, copper was 10 and chromium was 0. The copper reading is from the oil cooler having a copper core. Should be very low in another 20K or so. Compared to a good pleated paper filter the Amsoil allows 3ppm more silicon contaminant (dirt) into the engine resulting in approximately 1 or 2ppm more of iron as a wear metal. I base that on other oil analysisÆs I've had done from my Sequoia's oil.

after many years of K&N, i got "religion" and went back to toyota OEM paper filters chnaged out every 12000 miles.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Tahoma, Arial, Helv, Helvetica, Sans">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Tahoma, Arial, Helv, Helvetica, Sans">Originally posted by surlynkid:
<strong>after many years of K&N, i got "religion" and went back to toyota OEM paper filters chnaged out every 12000 miles.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Tahoma, Arial, Helv, Helvetica, Sans">AMEN to that brotha!!!!

Now now..

How many miles are on the Tundra?
Just why did you change the break in oil at 1000K when its to be 3500-5000?
Don't forget the silicone sealants could be to blame.

I've been happy with my Amsoil cellular filter (I know the K&N trauma of "the filter becomes effective after it accumulates dirt"...um so smaller particles go through until there is adequate blockage!! BS.

For the money, paper is cheaper.
But for my needs, reusing the cellular has passed the payoff point.

For all the troubles my Toyota has put me through, I can honestly say the 3.4ltr has been one reliable little motor.

Then again, your Tundra is worth far more than my T100.

My next truck is going to be (tap tap tap tap tap TAP TAP TAP) I SAID A DIESEL!!!

<img border="0" alt="[Shiner]" title="" src="graemlins/shiner.gif" />

[QUOTE]Originally posted by uzombie:
[QB]Now now..

How many miles are on the Tundra?

24,800

Just why did you change the break in oil at 1000K when its to be 3500-5000?

The first several (2 or 3) oil drains act as flushes (sooner the better)- there's nothing special (additives)about the oil from the factory. The engine manufacturing process leaves a lot of crud in the block and that needs to be cleaned out before the lab tests are considered "accurate".

Don't forget the silicone sealants could be to blame.

Could be - I never gave that a thought. I'll ask the lab next week as I have to call them on my viscosity readings which is out of whack - It shows my 0-30 weight as having the same viscosity as 0-40.

For whatever the heck its worth, I just finally took out and cleaned the Amsoil filters in both my trucks after 2 years use w/ no cleaning since new. There didn't appear to be any dust in the intake as I had noticed after using the K&N (or excess oil either). <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Cleaning and reoiling the filters was kind of a pain, but if I only have to worry about them every 2 years or so, I'd say its probably time and money well spent for me...